CEDI’S FALL: ALHASSAN ANDANI SAYS IT WILL CONTINUE

Alhassan Andani

By Mohammed Awal

The president of Ghana Bankers Association, Alhassan Andani has cautioned that until the fundamentals of Ghana’s economy are strengthened, the cedi will continue to depreciate in value.

Mr. Andani who is also the Managing Director of Stanbic Bank Ghana argued that the continuous dependency on imports at the expense of exports will continue to put enormous pressure on the local currency.

The cedi has performed poorly against major currencies since the beginning of the year, losing about 6 percent of its value to the Dollar.

In an interview with Starr Business during the re-launch of Stanbic Executive Banking proposition Mr. Andani urged government to change its focus in order to save the local currency.

“What we are not doing right is that we are not generating enough dollars, enough foreign exchange that we need. We’ve got to focus our attention on producing goods and services for export,” he said.

He continued that “we have this insatiable desire for imports but nobody is focusing on the exports sector and sometimes when there is pressure on the currency, everybody then turns to government and it shocks me when people in government respond because they don’t produce US dollars, it is the populace who produce US dollars, it is the enterprises which produce exports so we should avert our attention to those producing the US dollars or exports of goods and services and encourage lot more people to do that.”

Mr. Andani further stated the noise about the depreciation of the local currency will not help in finding a solution to the problem. He believes the answer lies in increasing local production to offset the “insatiable” demand for foreign exchange for imports.

“Sometimes we all think that we can talk down the rate or we can talk up the rate. As for the demand for foreign exchange, it’s virtually insatiable. Our food is exported, our clothing is imported, our cars, our fuel, our medicines. Doesn’t it frighten us?” he queried.

Stanbic Bank has revamped its Executive Banking proposition with the introduction of new packages such as an educational plan, a hospital cash cover and retrenchment cover.

Speaking at the launch of the repackaged product, Head of Personnel and Business Banking at Stanbic Bank Nana Dwemoh Benneh said the revamping of the product is in response to the needs of customers.

“This is yet another opportunity to prove to our customers our responsiveness to their needs. As a bank we believe a real banking experience goes beyond just deposits and withdrawals; for us it is about enriching lives…taking to heart the customer’s comfort and giving back to them what is just right for the betterment of their lives and Stanbic Bank is committed to doing just that,” he said.

Editorial

WE AGREE

Mr Alhassan Andani, Managing Director of Stanbic Bank has hit the nail right on the head and we fully agree with him.

According to him, the cedi will continue to fall if meaningful and practical measures are not taken to reduce imports and increase exports.

It is indeed strange that over the years, Ghanaian politicians pursuing the neo-liberal agenda have managed to convince themselves that they can stabilise the cedi.

The truth is that since Mr Rawlings and his PNDC started implementing the so-called Economic Recovery Programme (ERP), under the marching orders of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, the cedi has known no peace.

Over a period of about 30 years the cedi has suffered a devaluation of more than 30, 000 per cent.

It is time for the politicians to wake up to the reality that it is their actions and omissions which have collapsed the cedi.

The way forward lies in changing direction from neo-colonialism to the building of a self-reliant national economy within the broad context of Pan-Africanism.

LOCAL NEWS:

Schools Rejecting Pupils with Disabilities

Dr Matthew Opoku Prempeh, Minister of Education

By A.B. Kafui Kanyi

Public and private schools in the Ho Municipal area are reportedly refusing to enrol pupils with mental and developmental disabilities.

The schools allegedly claim they do not have facilities and the capacity to handle children with special needs and turn them away.

Mr Brandford Tay, Member, Steering Committee of Coalition of NGOs for disabilities in Ho, stated at a stakeholders meeting to develop a media strategy for inclusive education advocacy.

He said from September last year, about 20 schools in Ho had refused to admit five pupils citing lack of special needs teachers.

Mr Brandford said the act of discrimination had reached a crescendo with NGOs in disabilities struggling to find schools for children with disabilities in line with the policy on inclusive education.

He said though some district assemblies were restructuring school infrastructure to accommodate children with disabilities, the Ghana Education Service was showing no commitment to the implementation of the policy.

Mr Brandford cited the Ghana Education Service which continued to procure textbooks meant only for ‘abled’ children, with the argument that they had no budget to develop disability friendly teaching and learning materials.

“Our children who are persons with disability are really suffering. They are not getting social contact with their peers,” he stated.

Mr Eric Ofori, Member of the Steering Committee, said people with disability were citizens and ought to enjoy their rights.

He said it was wrong for policy makers to prepare budget for only ‘abled’ persons without procuring essential items for persons with disabilities.

The Ho-based Coalition is made up of the Lakeside Disability Rights Advocacy Initiative, the New Horizon Foundation for the Blind and Kekeli Foundation Ghana.

Mawuli School girls defecate in the open

By A.B. Kafui Kanyi

Female students of Mawuli School in Ho have resorted to open defecation due to water challenges and inadequate toilet facilities in the School.

The more than 1,200 girls are unable to manage five, seven-unit toilet facility at the girls’ dormitory with many defecating just behind their lavatories in the open and others shitting in polythene bags and disposing them at a refuse dump behind the lavatories.

The GNA was told a few female students also dig holes and defecate in them.

The practice popularly referred to by the students as "free range" has made the female dormitory environment unsightly, with flies traversing the lavatory and the refuse dump.

Some female students said they had no alternative due to irregular flow of water and pressure on the few toilets.

Mr Opoku Abima, Assistant Headmaster, said the Headmaster was not around and refused to comment on the issue. He only said that the School was working on a 20-unit toilet project.

Assemblies are part of government – Regional Minister

Ishmael Ashitey

Mr Ishmael Ashitey, the Greater Accra Regional Minister has urged assemblies to see themselves as key development partners to the central government.

He therefore called on them to explore other avenues to enhance revenue generation in order to step up development of their respective areas.

Mr Ashitey gave the advice when he met with the staff of Ada East and West District Assemblies in the Greater Accra Region during his working visit.

He said both districts were endowed with natural resources such as lagoons, islands and salt and that if well harnessed could generate huge revenue for development.

He asked the heads of the assemblies to take measures to woo investors to develop the tourism potential in the area for job opportunities and revenue generation.

The Regional Minister raised concern about the perennial budget deficit that had characterised almost every assembly and called for prudent management to plug financial leakages.

Mr Ashitey urged the assemblies to imbibe professionalism, transparency and accountability in all their dealings to avoid unnecessary spending.

Mr Mohammed Ziblim, the Ada West District Coordinating Director appealed to the Minister to assist the assembly with residential accommodation for some of the staff as well as additional vehicles to enable them to reach out for revenue mobilisation.

Bauxite 

By Fred Dzakpata 

President Nana Akufo Addo

Government is to establish an Integrated Bauxite Alumina Authority in the next three months.

The project, according to President Nana Akufo-Addo, is critical to exploiting the untapped mineral resources such as bauxite.

The Authority will have the task of mobilizing the relevant resources to better explore alumina industry in Ghana from exploitation to the creation of alumina product.

He was speaking at the Presidential Panel discussion at the just ended Africa CEO Forum in Geneva, Switzerland.

President Akufo-Addo wants investors to turn their attention to Ghana for possible partnership in exploring opportunities in the mining sector as he also hinted Government is close to clearing the 2.4 billon cedis energy sector debt which nearly crippled some banks in the country.

“Now that we trying to come to grips with the financial problems that are at the heart of our electricity challenges in Ghana, we are able to do so to provide the stimulus for industrial transformation that we require,” he told the gathering.

“Our country has enormous natural resources, bauxite and iron ore, we have decided that come what may, we are going to bring those resources into play,” he added.

Source:Starrfmonline.

Sacked police recruits a serious security threat – MP

Ernest Norgbey

By Delali Adogla-Bessa

National Democratic Congress (NDC) Member of Parliament for Ashaiman, Ernest Norgbey, is sounding the alarm of the potential security threat arising from the dismissal of police recruits from police training schools nationwide for using fake certificates.

Mr. Norgbey described the situation as “a disaster in waiting” as the sacked recruits could turn to crime given their new status of unemployment.

The mere fact that the recruits have had basic knowledge in police operations is as dangerous as having a weapon, the MP noted on the Point Blank segment on Eyewitness News.

“If you are unemployed and you don’t have anything to do, definitely you have to go for armed robbery, and now that you have the skills to operate, you can do just that… after training a person for months and giving him the necessary skills about security implications, it is obvious that person can also operate,” he argued.

Background

Over 40 police trainees have so far been dismissed from police training schools for allegedly using fake certificates to get recruited into the Ghana Police Service.

The affected trainees, who have been arrested, were recruited on November 15, 2016, and had been in the training schools for the past four months.

They are said to have either altered results on their certificates or changed the names on the certificates. Others were also found to have submitted certificates belonging to the opposite sex.

No place for late background checks

Mr. Norgbey looked to lay some blame at the feet of the police service for what he suggested were lax background check procedures not befitting a security institution.

He insisted that, late verification had no place in the security services because fraudulent persons may pick up key skills before they are found out.

“You have to do the studies around these people before you give them their appointment letters saying they are recruited. Security matters are different from tertiary school matters. You have to make sure you satisfy all the requirements before you give them letters for training,” he stressed.

FOREIGN NEWS:

Iran sanctions 15 US companies

Flag of Iran

Tehran has imposed sanctions on 15 US firms over their alleged backing of Israel and its perceived “atrocities” committed against Palestinians, according to a foreign ministry statement cited by the Iranian State Agency (IRNA).

“The sanctioned companies have, directly and/or indirectly, been involved in the brutal atrocities committed by the Zionist regime in the occupied Palestinian territories,” the statement said, as cited by the news agency. 

The alleged actions, Tehran claims, violated UN Security Council Resolution 2334, which calls on Israel to stop its settlement expansions.

As a result, the US companies in question are prohibited from making any deals with Iranian firms, and former and current top management of the companies will not be eligible for Iranian visas.

Among the companies are major US defense contractor Raytheon, Re/Max Real Estate, gun manufacturer Magnum Research, defense and military equipment producer Oshkosh Corporation, and Elbit Systems.

The measure comes after a missile test led the US to introduce sanctions against Iran in February, which Iranian authorities said violated the 2015 nuclear deal between the two countries.

Last month, US President Donald Trump blasted the US-Iran deal on Twitter, warning that he won’t be as “kind as [former US President Barack] Obama.”

“Imposition of new sanctions by the US is based on fabricated and illegitimate pretexts and amount to an action against the international regulations,” Tehran claimed, adding that strengthening its missile system is “enhancement of the country’s defense capabilities” and is not aimed towards aggression.

The Day Earth Was Murdered

By Dr. Paul Craig Roberts

 “Change you can believe in” disappeared in the early days of the Obama regime as the same Washington insiders filled the new government’s ranks. David Brooks sung the praises of those who made change impossible: “the best of the Washington insiders, Achievetrons who got double 800s on their SATs.”  

Eight years later Donald Trump was specific about the changes he intended, the two most important being normalized relations with Russia and the return home of the middle class jobs and associated state and local tax base that US corporations had moved offshore to foreign locations. But Trump’s government quickly became home to corporate polluters, Wall Street executives, defense contractors, and Russophobic generals.

Obama’s disappointed supporters held firm to their conviction that their man would set the agenda and not the Washington insiders who occupied his government. Trump’s disheartened deplorables are currently finding refuge in this same conviction. But it looks like we will not get the good part from Trump, only the bad part of more pollution and more damage to the social safety net.

Those who agree about this disagree over the explanation. Some insist that Trump, not Hillary, was the establishment’s choice from the beginning and that the fierce opposition to Trump played out in the press and on the airwaves was only an orchestration to convince flyover America that Trump stood for them. My view is different. Trump threatened the power and budget of the military/security complex and the profits of Wall Street before he had an organization and a team in place to impose his agenda. Unlike Michael Corleone, Trump was rash.

Consequently, the CIA, FBI, NSA, Democrats, John McCain and Lindsey Graham, and the presstitute media boxed Trump in by portraying him in collusion with Russian President Putin to steal the election from Hillary. Marches worldwide were instantly choreographed, and there were constant and escalating accusations portraying Trump and his associates as puppets on Putin’s string. Lists were made of Internet media sites that took exception to Washington’s wars and dangerous provocations of Russia, China, and Iran.

The attack on Trump seems to have succeeded. Trump lost his National Security Adviser who favored normalized relations with Russia. Trump was forced to prove he was not working for Putin by appointing a Russophobe as National Security Adviser. Trump backed off from an early meeting with Putin to reduce the tensions in the relationship caused by the past three US presidents.

The CIA won the fight by creating an atmosphere hostile to any thought that Russia is not a dangerous adversary and the main threat that the US faces. In other words, a preference for reduced tensions between nuclear powers has become evidence that one is a Russian agent or Putin’s dupe.

The CIA’s victory means that the prospect of nuclear Armageddon remains on the table, but the budget of the military/security complex is safe and rising. Is this an acceptable trade-off for you?

I was astonished to see the liberal/ progressive/ left line up with the CIA against peace and with globalism and Identity Politics against the working class. The liberal /progressive /left has turned against heterosexual white males and transformed the working class from a victim group into alleged victimizers of women, blacks, homosexuals, and Muslim refugees. The American left has degenerated into the Identity Politics that originated with Zionism. (See for example the article by Eric Draitser, the host of CounterPunch Radio.)

The political left, once a force for peace, has transitioned into a force for war, as war is the likely outcome of the high level of tension that now exists between the US and Russia. By helping the CIA handicap President Trump and prevent him from reducing these tensions, the liberal/progressive/left has responsibility for the impending danger.

These tensions are very dangerous. They have resulted in high-readiness nuclear alert postures, which together with short warning times, false signals of incoming missiles and distrust, create a dangerous strategic nuclear situation.

It is reckless for Washington to convince Russia (and China) that the US is preparing a pre-emptive nuclear strike against them. But that is what Washington is doing when it puts anti-ballistic missiles on Russia’s border and tells the Russians the lie that the missiles are there to protect Europe from Iranian ICBMs. The entire world knows that Iran does not have nukes or ICBMs. All Washington’s lie does is to make the purpose of the missiles obvious to the Russians.

The continuous anti-Russian propaganda issuing from Washington, NATO and the despicable Western presstitutes has the purpose of orchestrating a Russian Threat and preventing a reduction of tensions between the nuclear powers.

The demonization of Russia’s president and the clearly false charges against Russia, such as interference in the US presidential election, invasion of Ukraine, reconstruction of the Soviet empire—are understood by the Russians as a propaganda campaign to prepare Western populations for a pre-emptive nuclear attack on Russia. The conventional NATO forces conducting military exercises and deployed on Russia’s border are understood by the Russians as being too small and lacking in strength to be of any consequence. They are merely an orchestration to emphasize the Russian Threat for insouciant Western populations. The Russian government understands that all of this is preparation for an attack on Russia. Just as Saddam Hussein, Gadaffi, and Assad were demonized by US government officials, now it is Putin. The dangerous situation could not be more obvious.

Yet Hillary supporters are completely blind to what is occurring in front of their noses, as is the liberal/progressive/left, the idiot EU governments, and the Western presstitute media. As President Putin himself has stated,“no one listens to us when we point out the impending danger.”

As environmentally damaging as a pipeline can be, it is nothing compared to nuclear war. In the opposition to Trump, emotion has prevailed over reason and hate has prevailed over judgment. The consequences for life on earth will be dire.

Just as the CIA is indifferent to the threat to life on earth that the agency’s orchestration of the Russian Threat presents, and the liberal/progressive/left is too absorbed in hatred of Trump to comprehend that it is enabling the march to nuclear war, the Trump forces are enabling another catastrophic/apocalyptic threat by dismissing global warning as a hoax. That the obvious, observable melting of Arctic ice can be dismissed as a plot against capitalism by left-wing scientists demonstrates a detachment from reality that is difficult to fathom. For whatever reason the ice is melting, the consequence is the sudden enormous release of life-destroying methane into the atmosphere. As far as I am aware, the dire consequences of massive methane release are not controversial.

For a world that sees itself as based on science, it is amazing how uninfluential scientists are. They warn of the consequences of nuclear war, and Western governments continue escalating tensions between nuclear powers. Scientists warn of the consequences of global warming, and the polluting economic interests and their supporters cry “hoax.”

Read Dahr Jamail’s report on the latest published scientific report on the likelihood of a sudden and gigantic release of methane, and then go read the report itself. This is not the fake news that you get from the New York Times, BBC, CNN, Washington Post, Le Monde, MSNBC and the rest of the presstitutes. This report is peer-reviewed scientific opinion based on the known facts at hand.

What is known among scientists as the Artic “Methane Time Bomb” has been studied intensely. Scientists believe that a 50-gigaton “burp” of methane could be released in a brief period of time from the melting of the Arctic ice. This would be the sudden addition to the atmosphere of ten times the amount of methane currently in the atmosphere. Scientists equate this to an increase in carbon dioxide of 1,000 gigatons.

In other words, based on our existing scientific knowledge, life on earth depends on the Arctic ice not melting. But it is melting.

With the two apocalyptic scenarios described in this article both possibly close at hand, why is the liberal/progressive/left concerned with tranny toilet facilities and the freedom of Muslims to immigrate to Europe and the US?  Is this the way they distract themselves from the real threatening issues?

Why are the timber companies cutting down forests and why are the remaining rain forests being massacred when it is trees that absorb carbon dioxide and emit oxygen?

Why is there intense commercial farming of beef and pork when the methane release from the vast numbers of animals is extraordinary and a factor in the rising temperatures that are melting the Arctic ice?

The answer is that profit-seeking has only short-term motivations, and the profits come mainly from the external costs imposed on third parties and the environment. The effort to control what economists call externalities requires thoughtful and determined regulation. Yet, the Trump administration declares regulation to be a hindrance to business. In other words, regulation interferes with the ability of capitalism to generate profits by externalizing its costs, and, thereby, regulation must be abolished.

We have reached the point where the externalities of economic activity and the externalities of the military/security complex’s need for a Russian threat are on the verge of bringing life on Earth to an end.

The idiocy of Identity Politics is that the ideology has no idea that we are all victims of the real victimizers—the US military/security complex and a carbon-based life style.

Considering the dire circumstances, it really doesn’t matter if more Muslim refugees, whose countries and prospects we have destroyed with our wars of hegemony and who may be seeking revenge for what they have suffered, are admitted to the West. The danger of being run over on a London bridge or at a German bus stop by a Muslim seeking revenge is miniscule compared to thermo-nuclear war and catastrophic changes in the biosphere.

But don’t expect any intelligent awareness from any Western government or from any member of the Western presstitute media. Truth is the last thing that interests these purveyors of fake news. They are interested in manufacturing fake threats, not confronting real ones.

What these hyper-criminals are doing is murdering planet Earth.

The original source of this article is Global Research
Copyright © Dr. Paul Craig Roberts, Global Research, 2017

For Israel, The Solution Is The Land Without Palestinians

By Edu Montesanti and Maher Awawdeh

Maher Awawdeh, Director General of External Media at the Palestinian Authority Ministry of Information, speaks incisively about Zionist crimes against humanity in Palestine, one of the worst post-II World War.

Edu Montesanti: How do you evaluate the meeting between President Donald Trump and Prime-Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on February 15? “I’m looking at two-state and one-state” formulations, President Trump said during a White House news conference with Mr. Netanyahu. “I like the one that both parties like. I’m very happy with the one that both parties like. I can live with either one.”

Maher Awawdeh: One feels sorry for having such a passive position by the President of superpower-America, as leaving the solution to “the one that both parties like.”

This can have only one meaning that is letting Israel enjoy unchallenged impunity and violation to international law. The solution that Israel likes is that of land without Palestinians.

In fact Israel is actually acting according to this attitude. One only needs to have a look at the expansion of settlements across the West Bank and Jerusalem, the siege of Gaza, all of which can only have one goal, which is to have the Palestinian people leave their homeland.

Israel seems to be totally indifferent to the world and international law, because of the support it enjoys by the US and some western countries.

There is no country in the world that detains remains of dead civilians it killed and keeps them as bargain chips for over 40 years other than Israel.

There is no country that moves its militant immigrant population into occupied territories, by force, without the consent of the original and legitimate owners of the land.

There is no country in the world that openly builds separation walls right inside the territories it occupied by force and builds separate roads for its nationals, while denying the occupied nationals access to such roads.

Israel is the only country that denies the occupied people, the Palestinians, access to telecommunication technology; such as the 3G technology.

Israel is the only country that openly acknowledges enforcing a calorie restriction ration system against the besieged Palestinians in Gaza Strip.

Israel is the only occupier that oppresses the Palestinians and expects them to show gratitude for that.

We believe that the US should revise its policies in respect to democracy and human rights principles that are indivisible and can’t be enjoyed by some and denied for others. Ending the Israeli occupation is the only way to achieve peace in the region.

The Palestinian people should be able to enjoy all the rights the world nations enjoy. Land theft and daily murders and intimidations can’t bring stability nor peace. Israel must take the ICC and ICJ most seriously and the several international tribunals are but examples that Israel must remember, while these mechanisms are expected to take up their responsibilities towards the protection of the oppressed and suffering Palestinians.

Edu Montesanti: Why cannot Israel and the Palestinians decide alone the question? Why do Palestinians need a third party to get an agreement?

Maher Awawdeh: Israel seems to be determined to go all the way to a worse and more horrible apartheid model by combining occupation, land grab, ethnic cleansing and playing the role of chronic-victim, while enjoying the unconditional US support.

The Palestinians have already made their historical decision by recognizing state of Israel over more than two thirds of historical Palestine, while Israel signs agreements and then violates them.

The Palestinians are the occupied oppressed, who demand for statehood and independence like any other free country.

A third fair party is a must to ensure that Israel complies and respects the agreements it signs. Israel effectively controls all of the Palestinian land and controls all aspects of life. Thus having a fair third party is paramount to achieving justice and peace.

There are dozens of international resolutions and UN Security Council resolutions that Israel continue to violate, thus, there is a need for a third party to have this humanity nightmare come to a speedy and just end.

In fact, the situation will continue worsening, murders committed by Israel against the Palestinians, unless the free world wakes up to the fact that occupation corrupts, not only the free world but Israel as well. Just remember Tom Hurndel and Rachael Cure, Israel doesn’t even blink at killing any non-Israeli, without limiting that to Palestinians.

The army that kills injured civilians, while under control and then consider the murderer soldier a national hero and even ask school students to wear military uniform in solidarity with the murderer, this can only end with sincere, fair intervention efforts that observe international law and integrity principles.

Edu Montesanti: You know the Western media distorts the facts involving this massacre against Palestinians, Mr. Maher Awawdeh. Please number the crimes or at least some of them commited by Israel.

Maher Awawdeh: The bias and/or negligence or ignorance of the Western media concerning the Palestinian cause is well known, there were several recent incidents, such as the Israeli army murder of Abdul Fattah Elsharif in Hebron, although he was bleeding and controlled on the ground.

Many western media simply focused on the farce trial by Israel to the murderer Israeli soldier and showed him as a foolish ignorant boy instead of showing his real terrorist character and the military incitement to murder among the Israeli soldiers.

That soldier was sentenced to 18 months in prison, although he is still at large. The farce prison sentence is uglier and more criminal when compared to prison sentences ordered by the same Israeli court against Palestinian children, whom the court sentences to several years just for alleging they were throwing stones at the strongest army of the world.

The western media did very little in covering the many murders of Palestinian women and children at Israeli checkpoints and even ignored videos of Israeli soldiers planting knives near the bodies of Palestinian children after killing them to allege they were attacking soldiers.

Edu Montesanti: How do you evaluate the Western media coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?

Maher Awawdeh: I see it as negative, considering endless examples of using the situation of occupation and lack of Palestinian control to borders, thus you see many of such outlets simply entering the Palestinian territories without meeting the official Palestinian requirements for international journalists.

The Western media is doing very little to shed light on the Israeli incitement to murdering and killing the Palestinians in the Israeli schools. Instead, that media focuses a lot on Israeli allegations against Palestinian schools, the same schools that Israel is demolishing and destroying.

The Israeli racist separation wall that walls out majority of the occupied West Bank and only leaves the Palestinian citizens away from their land, hoping that they eventually leave their land after Israel restricted their ace their farms, the Western media; such as the AFP published a photo named “70 walls around the world protecting national borders” including that Israeli wall.

The news agency simply ignored the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice that considered the Israeli wall and settlement as a crimes, which must be removed and prohibited the international community from facilitating or acknowledging that crime.

The State of Palestine has asked many such media outlets to visit hunger striking Palestinian prisoners in Israel, but they declined in most of the cases, or publish things that were totally distorted or biased to the criminal Israeli occupation. Israel has installed gates at the entrance of every Palestinian community and closes them according to the whims of criminal military officers hoping to have the Palestinians leave their country, but the western media rarely writes about the suffering of Palestinians because of these restrictions or the suffering of women who have to give birth at these gates while waiting for such soldiers to allow them to proceed to hospitals.

Edu Montesanti: How is life in Gaza and the West Bank?

Maher Awawdeh: In Gaza, as I mentioned before, Israel is operating a calorie racist system, as they acknowledged that, whereby Israel allows food to enter in quantities enough for people stay in a miserable life.

In Gaza you can’t travel for any reason, including medication or study. Israel rations electricity-generation fuel supply to limit power supply by 4 hours a day maximum.

Same thing applies for construction materials that are mostly needed to reconstruct the devastated housed that Israel bombed and destroyed in the several wars it waged against Gaza.

Edu Montesanti: Professor Avi Shlaim observed days ago: “Sadly, the Palestinians are handicapped by weak leadership and by the internal rivalry between Fatah and Hamas.” Your view on the internal politics among Palestinians, please, Mr. Maher Awawdeh.

Maher Awawdeh: The Palestinian leadership is restricted by the Israeli occupation restrictions, as no Palestinian leader can supply fuel for electricity in Gaza without the consent of the Israeli occupation army, for instance.

The Palestinian leadership has been lobbying for international support to end this Israeli occupation and we all know that all starts or ends at the UN Security Council, nonetheless, the Palestinian leadership has succeeded in expanding international recognition of the State of Palestine and solidarity with the Palestinian people by raising international public awareness on this issue, take for instance the several arrest warrants against Israeli leaders in different countries and the expanding boycott against Israel.

Yes, the internal Fatah-Hamas rivalry is negatively impacting the Palestinian cause, but one mustn’t forget the Israeli and international interventions in this issue; such as limiting Palestinian self-healing potential by means of restrictions on the Palestinian leadership or public, including the ability to have elections, reconstruct destroyed houses and run a smooth democratic life at large.

Edu Montesanti: What could we expect from Arab leaders from now on?

Maher Awawdeh: Many of the Arab leaders are too busy with their internal issues, nonetheless many of them continue to support the Palestinian cause, thus, we are hopeful that the Arab countries would step up their support at the international forums, including the UN and use their relations with the US and other countries to ensure a more balanced and urgency for ending this Israeli occupation.

Edu Montesanti: What is the solution to the conflict, Mr. Maher Awawdeh?

Maher Awawdeh: One can’t have illegal occupation and ongoing crimes while expecting to have this conflict resolved. Israel is if flagrant violation to international law and continues wasting time and opportunities for peace.

The Palestinians have already made a historical concession and recognized Israel, but Israel continues asking for more and doing nothing to meet the Palestinian minimum, which is a sovereign state along the 1967 borders. Israel must comply with the endless international resolutions calling for ending the conflict based on this position, otherwise, Israel is simply going for a one state apartheid regime that is already existing.

Edu Montesanti: Do you want a two-State solution?

Maher Awawdeh: Yes, I believe in the two-State solution where Independent Sovereign democratic State of Palestine can prosper, live in peace and contribute to international stability and peace.

Edu Montesanti: Why not a one-State solution?

Maher Awawdeh: If you read the recent UN report by ESCWA which the UN Secretary General ordered canceling it before ESCOWA Secretary General Rima Khalaf had to resign, you will see how Israel operates as a shameless Apartheid regime.

In historic Palestine, the Palestinians can make a great majority, do you think the US and the west will allow for that? In few words the answer is – Israeli racism won’t allow for that.

Edu Montesanti: What are the principal obstacles for a fair agreement and solutions?

Maher Awawdeh: Only one obstacle that is the Israeli disregard to international law that calls for ending the Israeli occupation and establishment of independent State of Palestine across the 1967 borders.

This Israeli disregard to international law is certainly unjustly shielded and supported by the US and several US countries.

The original source of this article is Global Research
Copyright © Edu Montesanti and Maher Awawdeh, Global Research, 2017

Exposing Shabby Intelligence

By Philip Giraldi

There is a perception among some of the public and within the alternative media that America’s burgeoning national-security state is a monolith, a collective entity pursuing its own interests regardless of what is good for the country or its people. From both progressives and conservatives who mistrust the government, I often hear comments such as, “Once in the CIA, always in the CIA”—as if onetime employment in the agency forms an unbreakable bond.

Those familiar with both the national-security community and the peace movement are aware that something like the reverse is true. Individuals who were attracted to careers in intelligence, law enforcement, or the military are often sticklers for doing what is right rather than what is expedient. That often puts them at odds with their political masters, leading sometimes to resignations and a resulting overrepresentation of former national-security professionals in the anti-war movement.

One manifestation of this is an organization of former national-security officers, including myself, called Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, or VIPS. VIPS was founded in 2003 out of revulsion on the part of many former officials over the shabby intelligence that was driving the decision to invade Iraq. The group includes officials from the whole alphabet soup of national security—CIA, NSA, FBI, FS (Foreign Service), and DOD. VIPS’s emergence and its ongoing letters of protest on national-security policy reflect a reality going back to the early debates surrounding the U.S. government’s stealthy escalation of the Vietnam War and its woeful handling of that conflict, ending in a humiliating defeat.

The lies that led to that Vietnam experience produced one of the first well-known rebels against intelligence corruption. Sam Adams, a CIA analyst who was assigned to the agency’s Vietnam desk in 1965, observed that the strength estimates for the North Vietnamese Army and Vietcong guerrillas consistently underreported the true strength of the enemy. This led to a prolonged conflict with Army and White House officials, as well as with Adams’s own bosses, all of whom promoted the false notion that the Vietnam challenge was a limited insurgency easily defeated, a fabrication intended to ensure U.S. popular support for the conflict.

Michael Hogue

Though Adams eventually was forced out of the agency, he continued to expose how intelligence had been hijacked to suit a political agenda. He served as a witness in the trial of Daniel Ellsberg, the man behind the Pentagon Papers revelations. He wrote about the Vietnam “cover-up” and spoke to the House Intelligence Committee’s Pike Commission, which credited his allegations.

Today there are many former national-security officials in the mold of Sam Adams. For many, the disillusionment with the corruption of intelligence and betrayal of national security began with Iraq. CIA officers in the clandestine service such as European Division chief Tyler Drumheller pushed hard against CIA Director George Tenet and the White House, insisting that field reporting demonstrated that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. Drumheller also dismissed “Curveball,” the German-Iraqi source of the false intelligence that Iraq was building mobile biological-weapons labs. The source, said Drumheller, was merely “a guy trying to get his green card essentially, in Germany, and playing the system for what it was worth.”

CIA analysts also sought to expose false claims that Iraqi intelligence officials had met with al-Qaeda. Senior State Department officials John Kiesling, John Brown, and Ann Wright resigned over the march to an avoidable war.

For others, increasing governmental attacks on the Constitution proved decisive. National Security Agency (NSA) officer Tom Drake went through channels after he learned the agency was illegally collecting information on U.S. citizens in violation of the Fourth Amendment. He was joined by former NSA officers William Binney, J. Kirk Wiebe, and Ed Loomis. Their efforts were rebuffed by the government. Despite whistleblower protections, Drake later was charged under the Espionage Act.

The large numbers of former foot soldiers in the national-security establishment who are now opposed to the warfare state should be an eye opener for many Americans, suggesting that there is no “high confidence” among many of those who are actually best positioned to know the truth regarding Washington’s perpetual warfare policies.

Which brings us back to VIPS and the dissident former national-security officers who have found a home there. One is Tom Drake, who was involved from the start, as was Ray McGovern, a former senior CIA analyst and presidential briefer. VIPS has produced 47 memos on national-security policy. Its first official action was a February 2003 memo to President George W. Bush condemning the United Nations speech by Secretary of State Colin Powell that established the pretext for invading Iraq. The memo said,“you would be well served if you widened the discussion beyond … the circle of those advisers clearly bent on a war for which we see no compelling reason and from which we believe the unintended consequences are likely to be catastrophic.”

More recently, VIPS has raised serious questions about the conclusion of U.S. intelligence agencies that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered “Russian hacking” designed to destabilize American politics and, if possible, put Donald Trump in the presidency. The group called on President Obama to release solid evidence of this, even if it creates difficulty for ongoing intelligence operations. The former security officials suggested the evidence released by the government thus far “does not pass the smell test,” and they noted particularly the lack of any public evidence linking the Russians to WikiLeaks, which published the bulk of the information in question.

“We urge you to authorize public release of any tangible evidence that takes us beyond the unsubstantiated, ‘we-assess’ judgments by the intelligence agencies,” said the VIPS statement, addressed to Obama. “Otherwise, we … will be left with the corrosive suspicion that the intense campaign of accusations is part of a wider attempt to discredit the Russians and those—like Mr. Trump—who wish to deal constructively with them.”

The VIPS statement didn’t get much attention. Indeed, such warnings from former intelligence, security, law-enforcement, and military personnel are largely frozen out of the establishment media. When VIPS presents its annual Sam Adams award for integrity in intelligence, the recipients get more media attention in Europe than in the U.S. Rarely do the 50-plus associates of VIPS appear in the U.S. mainstream media, although they are frequently interviewed by the foreign press, particularly in Western Europe.

The government also does its best to repress any dissident opinion by requiring many former intelligence and law-enforcement personnel to have their writings reviewed by security officers prior to publication. The reviews can take months, make no effort to accommodate publishing deadlines, and often result in a heavily redacted text that is unreadable. The government sometimes strikes back in less subtle ways. Ray McGovern’s 2006 return of his Intelligence Commendation Medal over reports of CIA torture led to a provision in the Intelligence Authorization Act of 2007 enabling Congress to strip retirees of their pensions.

Pushback from former national-security officials is a good thing for the country and the agencies once served by these dissidents. Just as the Founders envisioned a citizen army so the defense of the nation would be in the hands of the people, a national-security structure responsive to responsible dissent should be cherished. The Obama administration, to its discredit, routinely punished legitimate whistleblowers and covered up its misdeeds through invocation of the state-secrets privilege. We can hope that the new Trump administration will have the wisdom and confidence to call off the dogs.

Philip Giraldi, a former CIA officer, is executive director of the Council for the National Interest.

The original source of this article is The American Conservative